As more functional medicine practitioners exit the insurance payer system in an effort to find greater satisfaction in their work, they find themselves in the unfamiliar (and sometimes uncomfortable) position of having to market their practice in order to attract new patients.
Here are three pillars of successful practice marketing to ensure your practice gains traction and becomes profitable quickly:
1. Build a Strong Marketing Foundation
A strong marketing foundation means two things: 1) differentiating yourself in the marketplace by selecting a well-defined niche, and 2) developing a deep understanding of your ideal client.
Practitioners often believe they will attract more patients by being everything to everyone. Yet this “generalist” approach often misses the mark because most people willing to pay cash for services have a specific health condition that is not being adequately addressed by the conventional system and are looking for a specialist.
Sometimes practitioners worry that by having a niche they’ll limit themselves or become bored. Never fear: You don’t have to choose an overly narrow niche, and you don’t have to turn away people who come to you for other issues.
Niching is a marketing strategy by which you seek to attract a certain kind of client; it’s not a hard and fast rule that says you can’t help others, if you wish to.
The second step in building a strong marketing foundation is to develop a deep understanding of your ideal client. How old are they? What gender? What do they struggle with? What are their hopes and dreams? Most importantly, what results do they want?
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